The Way the Cookie Crumbles

I don't know if there's any such thing as a recipe review, but you're looking at one anyway. I decided last weekend that I would attempt to make piñata cookies. I had admired them many times on the internet, but as they looked extremely difficult, I didn't try them. Anyway, I did have a nice chunk of time last weekend to finally make these cookies. Here's what they were supposed to look like:

from http://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipes/articles/958083/cinco-de-mayo-pinata-cookies

Here's what they did look like:

Not too bad, right? I did run into a few problems though, and perhaps if you were planning on making these cookies, you could avoid the mistakes I made. Here goes:

1. I used the recipe off of the website (http://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipes/articles/958083/cinco-de-mayo-pinata-cookies). It was pretty decent, but it did have 2 sticks of butter and 1 cup of oil--a bit too much fat, I would say. The cookies also ended up being really crumbly, which is surprising for the amount of liquid involved. If I make these again, I'm going to use my own sugar cookie recipe instead.

The crumby carnage left over

2. To get the different colors, you divide the dough into separate blobs, dye it, and layer it in a container. I tried to use food coloring for the first one. It made the dough way too diluted, since I needed a ton of food coloring to make the color change. Then I went out to buy food coloring gel, which worked perfectly. The moral of the story is, use the gel!

3. Then you bake the cookies. You slice up your chunk of layered dough into rectangles, and bake those. Only after the cookies are done do you cut the shapes. This is fine, because then you get a nice edge. However, it creates a tone of waste. From two pan-fulls of dough, I got a total of five piñata cookies and a dishful of scraps, which I promptly ate. Also, you must cut the cookies while they are still warm, so the cookies don't crack, but that creates a multitude of crumbs. I would recommend cutting the dough before you bake it. You won't have the pretty edge, but you will end up with a lot more cookies.

More carnage

4. Finally, buy mini m&m's! The large ones are fine, but you can fit more with the mini ones.

Oh, and in case you were wondering what I did with the crumbs...

I tried to make cookie-pops. They failed miserably, as you can see. Also, all the colors mixed together doesn't look all that appetizing.

Overall, it's a clever and creative recipe. Just use your own sugar cookie recipe, and don't be afraid to modify the way the recipe-writer made the cookies.